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Dromo's Den
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[Up] [Dromo's Den] Semiramis Biography SEMIRAMIS. A legendary queen of Assyria. According to Ctesias (in Diodorus Siculus, II, i), she was daughter of the Syrian goddess Derceto (of Ascalon), was exposed as an infant, but was miraculously saved by doves, and became the wife of one of the chief officials and generals of Ninus, King of Assyria and founder of Nineveh. She accompanied her husband on a campaign against Balkh and by her ingenuity and daring captured the city. This exploit won the notice of the King, and, captivated by her charms, he demanded her from her husband. The latter committed suicide. Semiramis married Ninus, bore him a son, Ninyas, and ruled as Regent after the King’s death. She founded Babylon and built the city in its full splendor. She conquered Persia, Egypt, Libya, and Ethiopia and invaded India, but there was defeated and wounded in personal combat with the King Stabrobates. Wherever she went she was said to have built cities and to have constructed great works. Ultimately her son plotted against her, and she disappeared in the sixty-second year of her age and forty-second of her reign. Tradition said she was changed into a dove and became a deity. She is represented as of sensuous character. The story is evidently an epitome of Assyrian history hung upon the names of Ninus and Semiramis. According to Herodotus (i, 184), there was a Semiramis Queen of Babylonia in the first half of the eighth century b.c. A governor of Calah erected a statue of the god Nebo to secure long life for Adadnirari V (812-783), his lord, and Sammuramat, the lady of the palace, his mistress, as well as for himself. It has been thought that this Sammuramat of history grew into the Semiramis of legend. The New International Encyclopaedia, Vol. XX (New York: Dodd, Mead & Co., 1920) 691. |